Introduction
By the turn of the nineteenth century, the Kraken had been deemed nothing more than a myth that was only supported by the exclusive minority of marine biologists. Instead, the Kraken found its own home in the realm of science fiction and literature. The Kraken became like that of the Bogeyman and Santa Claus - myths that could not be proved or disproved but remained there for historical purposes. Many poets and writers took the Kraken as an opportunity to write about biology and adventure, as did the famous writers Herman Melville and Jules Verne with their award-winning books about the Kraken.
1830 - Alfred Tennyson's The KrakenOne of the fictional works of the Kraken was by Lord Tennyson, a Great British Laureate. His poem The Kraken came from his collection Chiefly Lyrical. He describes the Kraken in great detail from the "enormous polypi" (tentacles) and his stagnation "hath he lain for ages and will lie" at the bottom of the sea. The poem also explores the whirlpools referenced by previous writers with the "roaring he shall rise and on the surface die" that the Kraken emits once he surfaces. The poem was written to the public domain for the intent of collecting numbers of different cultures in his Chiefly Lyrical collection. This poem is useful as it gives a British perspective of the Norse sagas, yet still a fictional one, so it could be considered slightly altered to the original. Nevertheless, it allows its readers to experience the myth in most of its full form.
|
Below the thunders of the upper deep;
Far, far beneath in the abysmal sea, His ancient, dreamless, uninvaded sleep The Kraken sleepeth: faintest sunlights flee About his shadowy sides: above him swell Huge sponges of millennial growth and height; And far away into the sickly light, From many a wondrous grot and secret cell Unnumbered and enormous polypi Winnow with giant arms the slumbering green. There hath he lain for ages and will lie Battening upon huge sea-worms in his sleep, Until the latter fire shall heat the deep; Then once by man and angels to be seen, In roaring he shall rise and on the surface die. Alfred Tennyson - The Kraken |
The four boats were soon on the water; Ahab's in advance, and all swiftly pulling towards their prey. Soon it went down, and while, with oars suspended, we were awaiting its reappearance, lo! in the same spot where it sank, once more it slowly rose. Almost forgetting for the moment all thoughts of Moby Dick, we now gazed at the most wondrous phenomenon which the secret seas have hitherto revealed to mankind. A vast pulpy mass, furlongs in length and breadth, of a glancing cream-color, lay floating on the water, innumerable long arms radiating from its centre, and curling and twisting like a nest of anacondas, as if blindly to catch at any hapless object within reach. No perceptible face or front did it have; no conceivable token of either sensation or instinct; but undulated there on the billows, an unearthly, formless, chance-like apparition of life. As with a low sucking sound it slowly disappeared again, Starbuck still gazing at the agitated waters where it had sunk, with a wild voice exclaimed- "Almost rather had I seen Moby Dick and fought him, than to have seen thee, thou white ghost!"
"What was it, Sir?" said Flask. "The great live squid, which, they say, few whale-ships ever beheld, and returned to their ports to tell of it." Excerpt of Moby Dick, Herman Melville, Chapter 59 (Squid) |
1851 - Herman Melville's Moby DickAmerican novelist Herman Melville was one of the first to write a novel about whaling and was also one of the first to write a fictional tale of that of a giant squid. His legendary novel Moby Dick is centralised around a whale, but in the 59th chapter the whaling group is intercepted by a "vast pulpy mass, furlongs in length and breadth, of a glancing cream-color" with "innumerable long arms radiating from its centre". Whilst it was not aggressive or nearly as large as the Kraken, Melville admits that this chapter was dedicated to that of the Kraken as it was described to "blindly catch at any hapless object within reach". Although the squid's size was not mentioned, it was told that "the great live squid" was not well known as "few whale-ships ever / returned to their ports to tell of it", similar to that of the Kraken's tale of devouring exploration ships.
Melville's goal was to expand America literature to other parts of the world and this connection between the United States and Scandinavia was one of the successful links of globalisation and familiarity, particularly posthumously with his international success of his novel Moby Dick. |
1870 - Jules Verne's Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea
Jules Verne was an avid science fiction writer and wrote with passion, particularly his bestseller above that followed a league of privateers under a captain piloting the world's first practical submarine, the Nautilus freely exploring the depths of the ocean without any governmental restriction. They encounter the Kraken and attempt to kill it but are unable; they are also attacked by a band of giant squids and one crew member is killed.
|
1928 - H. P. Lovecraft's The Call of Cthulhu
The Cthulhu is an appropriated humanoid version of the Kraken. H.P. Lovecraft was writing less of reason like Verne, Melville and Lord Tennyson did but rather for entertainment, as he wrote for Pulp Magazine Weird Tales and The Call of Cthulhu was one of his more successful stories. This cthulhu shows many differences to the kraken - being that they had a cult worshipping and that it lacerated and binded and even enchanted its victims together to chant certain words, which comes more out of exorcist tales than adventuring ones of the kraken. However, the physical features are very similar. The Cthulhu's head has, instead of a mouth, an array of flailing tentacles that hang down like a long beard. The face was like that of a cuttlefish and had demonic wings, essentially resembling a tentacled demon.
|
1970 onwards - Popular culture
The Kraken has become in modern society merely a mythical creature that has been used in a number of selected technologies, films and games. Tomb Raider: Underworld used the Kraken as one of its puzzle challenges but was only the size of a large room and had a head like an octopus. Pirates of the Caribbean used both a Cthulhu, Davy Jones, and his pet Kraken which devoured ships that did not hold up to Davy Jone's agreements. This Kraken was one of the most visibly accurate, as the Kraken in Dead Man's Chest was at least ten kilometres in width, similar to Jacob Wallenberg's writings of the Kraken being the size of Öland. A Song of Ice and Fire has the kraken as a sigil of the House of Greyjoy and in the television adaptation A Game of Thrones, the sigil resembles a giant squid. Film television has also adapted uses for the kraken, in particular Japanese cartoon Squid Girl plays on the word "kraken" in substitute for curses as the main character is a squid girl, similar in species to the Great Kraken.
Sources (Adaptations)
Greekgeek. (2012). Squid Myths: From Kraken to Cthulhu. Available: http://greekgeek.squidoo.com/squid-mythology. Last accessed 30/8/14.
Barbara A. Stowell. (2009). Kraken in Culture: The Kraken. Available: http://www.cgdclass.com/stowellbarbara/spring_240_portfolio/ccsite/fantasy/culture.html. Last accessed 30/8/14.
Barbara A. Stowell. (2009). Kraken in Culture: The Kraken. Available: http://www.cgdclass.com/stowellbarbara/spring_240_portfolio/ccsite/fantasy/culture.html. Last accessed 30/8/14.